I have been an admirer of Arthur Hughes' writing for many years. His books The Complete Database Marketer and the splendid Strategic Database Marketing are among the best in the genre. Especially the latter has helped me a lot in my own projects as a database marketing specialist.Now Arthur returns with a new book, another fine read. There are some things to be mentioned though.
Ed Sander, Failsafe Database Marketing
First of all, you should first read Strategic Database Marketing before you read this one. Although some of the subject matter of the two books overlaps, the theoretical background is explained much better in Arthur's previous book. For instance, the Lifetime Value case in The Customer Loyalty Solution is far too complex as a first taster.
Second, the title. I really don't think it does the book justice since it covers much more ground than just loyalty programs. With a title like this it might easily get lost between the dozens of other customer loyalty books on Amazon. Personally I would have suggested something like "The Database Marketing Case Book" instead, since the book mainly consists of some 40 short and longer case descriptions which illustrate the power and possible results of database marketing combined with the Internet. As such, it is a great companion book to Strategic Database Marketing, which focusses more on the 'how to'.
Third, although there is - as I mentioned - certain overlap with Strategic Database Marketing, this book does cover a few highly interesting (new) subjects in more detail. To name a few:
- What is the difference between CRM and DBM ? Which is better ?
- Why have catalogers not used DBM ?
- Calculating the value of names and e-mail addresses.
- Selling versus communicating on the web. Which one works ?
- E-mail marketing.
Also, most of the cases and options described are evaluated using the Lifetime Value theorie, which is very clear an useful. All chapters also include a summary, checlists of things that work and don't work and a quiz to test your understanding of the described cases.
All in all another fine and inspiring book by Arthur. Not as essential as Strategic Database Marketing, but a must have for anybody who has already digested that title and wants an extra 'grand desert'.
